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How To Steal a Space Shuttle
An anonymous reader tips a piece by Jason Torchinsky at Jalopnik, who attended the California Science Center's press conference about moving Space Shuttle Endeavour through Los Angeles to its final resting place. While he was there, he noticed that security for the event was focused less on the shuttle than on keeping the city itself safe. So, after a helpful LAPD officer suggested it would be impossible for a supervillain to make off with OV-105, Torchinsky went ahead and made a plan to do just that. All he needs is a submarine, a score of Sikorsky CH-53E heavy-lift helicopters, a salvaged and disguised Buran spaceplane, and the assistance of Switzerland.
Surely they wouldn't follow him into space, and it's kind of a supervillian thing to do!
Shouldn't this be in the "book reviews" section of Slashdot instead of "science"?
Haven't people learned? In this day and age, even joking about stealing/damaging US gov't property can be considered an act of terrorism.
Now I have to come up with a new plan.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
It becomes almost trivial to steal a spaceship once you're President of the Galaxy.
These are the types of two faced men we should watch out for.
So, after a helpful LAPD officer suggested it would be impossible for a supervillain to make off with OV-105, Torchinsky went ahead and made a plan to do just that. All he needs is a submarine, a score of Sikorsky CH-53E heavy-lift helicopters, a salvaged and disguised Buran spaceplane, and the assistance of Switzerland.
Bet'cha the crew from Leverage could do it. They probably wouldn't even need the Swiss, although they might borrow a minister or two for misdirection
They did 'steal' the Spruce Goose, after all... :o)
"I love animals! Some are cute, others are tasty, what's not to like?" - Betsy Schroeder, Jeopardy contestant
Dont forget the obligatory Bond antagonistic music in the background.
This is obviously viral marketing for Ocean's Fourteen.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
Next Season, on Breaking Bad
Jessie: Oh come on, Mr. White! We have $480,000,000! Each! I'm out!
Walt: Really Jessie? This is about money to you?
Jessie: Wasn't that the whole point? To leave your family money, and then to make an empire because you're mad you made a bad decision with Gray Matter? Why do you need a space shuttle? Bitch?!
Walt: Jessie, Hank is on to us. We need to get out of his jurisdiction. Out of everyone's jurisdiction! And that shuttle is our ride.
What makes you think that is the real shuttle?...mwuhuhahahaha [evil laughter trails off]
-badford
now the space shuttle. when will the evil stop?
Good people go to bed earlier.
Horrible plan.
First, if you already have a Buran, what would you need the shuttle for?
You're going to put a giant, top-opening cargo hold in a submarine?
And then you're going to bring it to flight-readiness? Couldn't you just buy the Buran and bring that to flight-readiness?
>> "While Bond supervillans tend to have these sorts of facilities and liquidity, they don't really exist..."
Well that exactly what Blofeld wants you to think.
Especially the part where the Swiss submarine is docking in those Swiss harbours is interesting.
But while you did this, I used all that confusion to replace the Mona Lisa with a fake one :)
Privacy is terrorism.
To paraphrase the piano enthusiasts, it's not a shuttle but rather a shuttle-shaped piece of furniture.
Moonraker
The Admin and the Engineer
Don't forget...
(holding pinkie to mouth)
One MILLION dollars...
International Committee of the Red Cross was created in Geneva, Switzerland, http://www.icrc.org/ by Henry Dunant http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Dunant and other nice people.
Geneva Conventions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geneva_Conventions were accepted, well, in Geneva.
It is sort of a good serious place.
And the rocket launchers and gatling guns. No point in skimping.
This post contains no rudeness or derision of any kind. All arguments are friendly. Terms and exclusions may apply.
You have not been in Moscow for a while. Here it is: http://www.moninoaviation.com/g6a.html
1. Acquire Buran
2. Call off plan since you already have a shuttle
your thin skin doesn't make me a troll
I'll just make a few calls...
I know he wants a NASA space shuttle. ;)
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
How do you fence it?
This is even more pointless than stealing "The Scream". At least you could just walk out with a painting so hot it sets your house on fire. With this spaceplane heist you're putting an awful lot of time and money in to acquire something with zero return.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
Yes, but it wouldn't be as fun!
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
Kirk - "Scotty, do you have the coordinates?"
Scotty - "Aye Captain!"
Kirk - "Good. Transport them directly into the shuttle bay. Start with the Enterprise."
Spock - "Quite logical Captain!"
Scotty - "Does this make us supervillians Captain?"
Kirk - "We are just protecting them, Until NASA realizes they still need them"
*boop* *beep* *whirrrrrlllll*
How can I see this replacing "how would you move Mt Fuji" as a future interview question?
Moonraker
He should call Franz Harary. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Harary/
The LAPD was right, it's impossible (in practical, not necessarily absolute, terms).
Meanwhile some feller with the ludicrously unlikely name of Elon Musk is building ICBMs right in plain sight.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
It would be easier to steal the USS Missouri from Pearl Harbor.
"Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
But then you have to worry about the cook.
Sigs are for losers
No thanks. Leave Switzerland out of your business proposal. We want nothing to do with you.
Ernst Schmidt
Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck
Perhaps the security is adequate if that is the best plan.
Security is not about making absolutely sure, it's about:
1. Lowering likelyhood: Making it reasonably hard to break, so that the bad guys will go somehere else.
2. Spend wisely: Not spending more to defend that the likelyhood of loss times (value lost + value bad guys gain) (in general terms)
BTW:
a. Round up the likelyhood, the bad guys are better than you at getting ideas.
b. Destroy sensitive and remove generally valuable parts to reduce the bad guys value
c. The value lost is *not* the money spent on the lost property. Perhaps you wasted a small bit of effort making it? pehaps you can recreate new and better cheaper?
I think the value of the space-shuttle is mainly sentimental and image-loss on theft, so you should probably not spend more than a simple escort -- mainly to prevent traffic-problems.
SLOGEN [ http://ungdomshus.nu : Sebastian cover music]
. . . for when he finds himself up shit's creek!
It would be cheaper to buy it from the US as salvage. Have you seen that crappy old rustbucket lately? Sure they put a new coat of paint on it, but I wouldn't risk my life flying in that thing. Might make a cool ground-based home though.
Screw that old RV, and cooking in roach-infested houses.Imagine the crystals they can grow in microgravity!
Just hope Jesse's funyun crumbs don't screw up the environmental control system...
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Now we know what Canada's maple syrup reserve was stolen for!
So.. nick a buran spaceplane. Wonderful though the shuttle was, given the technology at the time, a shuttle/spaceplane was the logical design for any spacefaring nation. I'd have loved to see Buran make more than test flights. Even then it had advantages over the shuttle as it could make automatic landings, something which wasn't added to the shuttle for decades. Buran was sadly brought to its knees due to Russian political in-fighting; crippled due to the economy dropping into the toilet and finally killed due to such poor funding its own shelter fell on; it crushing it. Flag-wave all you want, but I'm saddened by such technological beauty being neglected due to political "them -vs - us"squabbles. I've one of Buran's thermal tiles on a shelf and was really shocked by just how light they were, given the heat they could manage. RIP buran.
When the chaos is at its climax, a fleet of 10 Sikorsky CH-53E heavy lift helicopters wearing NASA Emergency Rescue livery will show up, and heroically inform everyone that they're here to take the Shuttle to a more secure location, away from the fire, and all that, back at LAX.
I don't think it would be possible for 10 choppers to coordinate to lift a load like that, the diameter of the rotors on the chopper is 80 feet, and the wingspan of the shuttle is 80 feet, so they would be pulling at an angle, which even if they could maintain the proper separation, would reduce their payload capacity. Worse, if one chopper loses or reduces power, the downward force would pull all of the choppers closer together, likely causing their rotors to collide. This coordination would be much harder to maintain when they fly into the smokescreen. To do this in real life, they'd need some kind of special bracket to allow the choppers to have enough horizontal separation to lift vertically.
Meanwhile, the real Endeavour is being flown a few miles West, out to the Pacific. While in flight, a crack team of Swiss military aerialists will wrap the Shuttle in camouflaged and water-tight plastic wrap, like they use for boats and other heavy equipment when shipping.
It seems highly unlikely that they'd be able to get a watertight seal around all of the tow ropes while airborne.... though they are a *crack* team, so maybe.
Once wrapped, the tethers holding the Shuttle will be released, sending the plastic-coated orbiter plunging into the icy Pacific.
This part is even harder - the picture in the article shows the shuttle sinking under the water to the special submarine, except that the shuttle wouldn't sink, it would float.
The shuttle cargo bay alone is 18m x 4.5m x 2m (estimated), or 162 m^3, which would displace 162,000 kg or water, or around 178 US tons. Add in the rest of the volume of the shuttle, and it's probably closer to 250 tons of displacement. The sub would have to come snatch it from the surface. I assume that something like an 16,000 ton Ohio Class sub would be able to submerge even with a 200 ton buoyant chamber on it, but I don't know for sure - I don't know how close to neutrally buoyant a sub is.
And of course, if the shuttle was submerged, it's unlikely that it could handle much pressure - it's designed to be under positive pressure in space, every 30 feet under water is one atmosphere of negative pressure, which the shuttle was never designed for.
And then finally there's the problem of what to do with it once they get it, the article suggests:
A country with a motive, like maybe a strange fixation on neutrality to the degree they've made their country a fortress and they may be interested in getting a spaceship for an off-world colony, fast.
If they are building a space colony, they'd probably want to get higher than the 400 mile max orbit of the shuttle. And if they just want a launch vehicle, for the $600M they are spending on the 20 CH-53E's, they may as well pay the Russians to take them to space, since they Russians can launch them cheaper than the $450M/flight it costs for the shuttle. And, of course, the shuttles are no longer spaceworthy, and it's likely that no one (not even NASA) has the ability to take a mothballed shuttle that's been on an underwater journey and make it spaceworthy again.
If I were a Mythbuster, I'd declare this myth "Busted", as I don't see any way it could work in real life.
Make jokes about stealing a space shuttle, something capable of dropping orbital nukes, and everyone thinks it's the funniest thing. But make one remark at the airport about how you thought that great new movie was 'the bomb' and they hall you away...
"How to steal a spaceshuttle"?!
How to Kill a Mockingbird seems more plausible.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
from the people in Washington state.
Swissair was liquidated in March 2002. Its successor, Swiss International Air Line, was taken over by the German airline Lufthansa in 2005.
Also the choice of Switzerland government as main actor seems extremely bizarre to whoever knows a bit how Switzerland works. The private Swiss banks do cultivate secrecy, not the government (the Swiss secret services are rather amateurish). A highly decentralized and democratic state like Switzerland makes any coordinated, well prepared and secret operation of this kind very difficult. Further, the motivation for planning such an operation, to colonize space in case of emergency, is beyond ridiculous.
... is actually not run by the state and is not called Swissair. The company he's looking for is "Swiss International Air Lines" (since 2002) and is a subsidiary of the German airline Lufthansa (since 2005).
Otherwise, the plan seems legit.
Sure, but where would you park it?
THINK! It's patriotic
You'll need a steamroller as well.
I come here for the love